Washington, September 5, 2026 (Yes Punjab News)
Minority women and girls in Pakistan continue to face alleged gender- and religion-based persecution, including abductions, forced conversions, forced marriages, sexual violence, workplace harassment, acid attacks, honour killings and blasphemy allegations, according to a report and analysis cited by Turkish journalist Uzay Bulut.
Writing in US media outlet PJ Media, Bulut said minority women and girls also remain vulnerable to sexual exploitation in debt-bonded labour, particularly at brick kilns.
She argued that international sanctions against Pakistani officials over alleged human rights abuses remain possible under existing mechanisms, including measures targeting individuals rather than the wider population.
“Individual countries or unions (like the United States, Canada, the UK, and the European Union) have global human rights sanction frameworks,” Bulut stated. She said such mechanisms can allow governments to freeze assets and impose travel restrictions on officials, judges or police commanders allegedly involved in abuses.
Bulut also pointed to the European Union’s Generalized Scheme of Preferences Plus (GSP+) trade arrangement, under which human rights compliance is monitored. She said violations can potentially lead to the suspension of trade preferences.
Citing the advocacy organisation Jubilee Campaign’s report ‘Stolen Girls’, presented at the European Parliament on July 14, Bulut said 210 cases involving abduction, forced religious conversion, child marriage and sexual violence against Christian and other minority girls had been documented across Pakistan between 2019 and 2025.
According to her account of the report, the cases allegedly reflected a broader pattern involving fraudulent documentation, manipulation of legal processes and institutional failures.
Bulut said the documented victims had an average age of 12.8 years, while the alleged perpetrators had an average age of 35.8 years. Several cases reportedly involved an age difference of more than 30 years.
She further said that hundreds of Christian and Hindu girls and young women allegedly abducted by Muslim men continue to await an opportunity to return to their families.
The issue has also drawn attention from US lawmakers. Last week, a bipartisan group of members of Congress urged Pakistani authorities to protect 18-year-old Christian woman Neha Faqir, who was allegedly abducted, converted to Islam and denied a private meeting with her family.
Representative Chris Smith, Republican co-chair of the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission, said the case raised serious concerns about religious freedom and the rights of minority women in Pakistan.
“The circumstances surrounding Neha Faqir’s disappearance and subsequent conversion raise profoundly troubling questions about her safety, freedom of religion, and ability to exercise her rights without coercion or intimidation,” Smith said.
Smith and 10 other members of Congress sent a letter on August 20 to Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Law and Justice, Azam Nazeer Tarar, urging the government to take appropriate action to ensure a just resolution of the matter.
The lawmakers called on Pakistani authorities to use the country’s judicial system to ensure Faqir’s physical safety and well-being, provide her with confidential access to independent legal counsel, allow her to communicate freely and privately with her family, and ensure that any further judicial proceedings allow her to express her wishes without intimidation or undue influence.
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